Comments on PHREADOM: "Intellectual Property" is Fiction.

It is a problem of homesteading. A person who put...

2008-07-30T14:41:00.000-04:00

It is a problem of homesteading. A person who puts tiny pits on a blank CD sells the CD and its pits not the content. A person who buys an old car and fixes it up increases the value of the previously less valuable car. The value is added when others in the market are willing to freely exchange another good for the fixed car. The value is in the exchange of a ‘homesteaded’ good.

In IP, the blank page with writing is exchanged. The content of the page is the labor which increases its market value. The content makes it desirable in exchange.

Projecting a movie in an outdoor drive-in theater is another example. A person with binoculars on a near hillside could watch the movie, but there is a lack of prestige compared to viewing the movie within the bounds of the drive-in. Since it is impossible to impute the value of foregone revenue by free riders, there is no provable damage. I am sure RIAA or drive-in theater owners would argue with me on this point, but you can not prove that a free rider would buy a ticket or a CD otherwise. No harm, no crime.

Anonymous is correct that demanding state-enforced...

2008-07-07T11:17:00.000-04:00

Anonymous is correct that demanding state-enforced viewing fees for a marketplace dance would be nonsensical. It is a valid reductio ad absurdum, however, because it directly applies one of the putative justifications for IP/copyright law.

Likewise the claim that someone who publishes a work has the right to sue non-contracting parties for seeing or hearing the work - based on the argument that they deserve remuneration on the basis of the effort expended - is also nonsensical.

Some of the worst arguments I've ever seen. The ju...

2008-06-29T11:29:00.000-04:00

Some of the worst arguments I've ever seen. The jumping jack hypothetical was particularly nonsensical. Congratulations.

Cool blog and outstanding post, thanks for linking...

2008-06-19T02:35:00.000-04:00

Cool blog and outstanding post, thanks for linking me to it over at my blog.

You've made a good argument for why IP is a fallacy. One thing I'd add to the debate, when facing a person who just can't get beyond believing that property rights can and should exist in ideas, is this:

even if IP were true, an individual interested in protecting his IP would still not be correct to force me, A, B, C and any number of other people, who may or may not benefit from his claim to IP, to help pay to protect his IP. Like all forms of property, protecting IP should be incumbent upon the theoretical owner to bear the costs... not society. To think (and act) otherwise is just more socialism.